


Stability

by rosehips



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: F/M, Mild Angst, Romance, a little fluff, a winning recipe if i do say so myself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-21 21:44:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13152636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosehips/pseuds/rosehips
Summary: When Olivia takes on a case that Rafael can’t be any part of, he doesn't see her for weeks. Her sudden reappearance throws him off balance, and then back into it again.Written for thebarsondaily's Barson fic exchange, and for the prompt “first kiss in an office.” Rated T for brief mention of sex crimes.





	Stability

**Author's Note:**

  * For [khughes830](https://archiveofourown.org/users/khughes830/gifts).



> Thank you khughes830 for your prompt – I had so much fun with this! Thanks also to the wonderful Eli who helped me brainstorm and encouraged me as I wrote.

It’s been two weeks since he last saw her.

Rafael has tried to be patient. He’s tried not to worry. After all, she knows what she’s doing, and she doesn’t need him there to do her job. 

So at first he hadn’t been worried at all, when she told him at Forlini’s that she’d had to take a case in which he couldn’t be involved. Curious, certainly, but not worried.

“Don’t tell me you’re investigating someone in the DA’s office,” he’d said wryly over his drink, raising an eyebrow. Then grinned: “No, really, don’t tell me or we’ll both be in trouble.”

Olivia hadn’t smiled, hadn’t even rolled her eyes. That’s when the first tendril of doubt crept in.

“It’s not just a recusal or a conflict of interest,” she said. Her voice was low under the Friday evening clatter and chatter of the bar, and her eyes didn’t stray from his for a second. “IAB made it very clear that you shouldn’t come down to the precinct during the investigation. They don’t want any communication between you and SVU until it’s done.”

He frowned, tapping at his glass. “What about the Mendelson case? I need to prep Rollins for her testimony next week. And Fin still hasn’t gotten that paperwork back to me, so I’ll have to -- ”

“I don’t know,” she interrupted, waving her hand as though his concerns were petty, to be brushed away. “Apparently IAB is working with the DA to push back a few trial dates. Right now we think the investigation will only take a couple weeks, and if it goes longer… I don’t know,” she repeated with a sigh. “They’ll rearrange things some more.”

Rafael studied her face. “Do I need to be worried?”

She softened. “It has nothing to do with you, Rafa” she assured him quietly, “and you’re not in any kind of danger. It’s just -- ”

“But you are?” he asked.

“What?”

“You said I’m not in danger. Will you be, during this investigation? More than usual, I mean.” He was leaning forward now, eyes intent upon hers. 

Olivia gave another dismissive wave of her hand. “It’s fine.”

He looked skeptical. “Hmm. I wonder if I’ll ever believe you when you say that.” He forced a smile back onto his face. “You’ll have to try again tomorrow and we’ll see.”

Her face fell. “Rafael, no. I can’t see you at all.”

He straightened up on his stool. “You said I can’t come down to the precinct. Surely that doesn’t mean --”

“It does.” She rested her elbow against the bar, her head against her hand, and, face tilted, looked up at him. “I won’t be able to see you at all,” she explained. “But it’s only for few weeks.”

For some reason he didn’t care to acknowledge, his heart picked up its pace. “Liv… can you at least call me, or text, just to let me know you’re okay?”

She dropped her hand and shook her head no. “I’ll be okay,” she reassured him.

“You don’t know that.”

She grimaced. “Look, I can’t tell you much, but we’re not looking into anyone with a history of violence, alright? I mean, there may be some some… affiliations,” she admitted, “but that’s not certain. That’s why we’re investigating.”

His brain was wracking through the possibilities already: a judge? Another prosecutor? The D.A.? No, it couldn’t be Cutter, but maybe there was some kind of conspiracy elsewhere; he couldn’t imagine any other reason she’d have to keep him so thoroughly in the dark.

“Okay,” he said, letting out a breath. He didn’t miss the way she looked both sad and relieved. 

“Okay,” she echoed. “I should go.”

He swallowed a lump that shouldn’t have been in his throat in the first place. She was reaching for her wallet and before he could stop himself he caught her wrist. “I’ll cover it,” he told her, and he could have just said that, but instead he was holding -- holding her hand, he realized with something close to shock, and the feeling only intensified when she held on so he couldn’t pull away.

“Thank you,” she said after a moment, and it took him another one to realize she was talking about the check.

She stepped forward, and for a moment he thought maybe she was going to hug him, or even… but she just gave him a clap on the shoulder, a squeeze of his hand, and then she was gone.  
  


And she’s been gone for two weeks. Not a word, not from anyone -- her, the rest of the squad, the DA. Rafael hasn’t asked questions because he’s not sure who to trust or how much he’s even supposed to know. He’s got the feeling that Olivia may have been bending the rules by telling him as much as she did, and he’s not about to let anyone know that she did.

Instead, he’s been keeping his eyes and ears open, trying to get a sense of who could possibly be the subject of the investigation. He thinks maybe he’s gotten a little paranoid, because he’ll catch sight of people whispering in hallways only to see them hurry in separate directions as soon as someone passes by, and that’s not uncommon in a building full of lawyers, but still. Still. He starts staying at the office late -- well, even later than usual -- in the hopes that he’ll hear something more.

That’s why he’s here tonight at 10pm. Eyes drooping, though he’s only had a finger or so of scotch to keep himself company as he goes through paperwork for a Homicide case he’s consulting on. The room is dim, his work lit only by the lamp on his desk, and that’s not helping either. When he catches himself nodding off for the third time, he decides it’s time for him to call it a night. He’s gathering his things when he hears a noise outside his office, and freezes.

The cleaning crew has come and gone by now.

He’d thought he was the last person in the building.

But clear as a bell he can hear footsteps coming down the hall.

_ We’re not looking into anyone with a history of violence,  _ Liv had said, he reminds himself; there’s no reason to panic. He’s not in any danger. His colleagues work late too sometimes, and there are a hundred reasonable explanations as to why someone would be walking towards his office. Even so, he thumbs on his phone and hovers over the “emergency call” button. 

The footsteps grow louder. Walking directly  _ into  _ his office.

He stands stock still behind his desk, heart racing, painfully aware that there is nothing he can do if he actually  _ is _ in danger except call for help.

His office door swings slowly open.

It’s Olivia.

“I thought you might be here,” she says quietly, half-smiling at his shocked face, his mouth agape.

“What are  _ you  _ doing here?” he hisses, and it comes out almost as an accusation. He’s aware that he’s flushed, embarrassed at his own fear from just a moment ago, and the relief of seeing her is tempered by that and by his total confusion.

“Checking in,” Olivia answers, and she locks the door behind her. When she turns around, her smile is gone. 

He comes out from behind his desk. “What’s wrong?” he asks, because something clearly is. He can see it in her tense jaw, her raised shoulders.

“I can’t tell you.”

He frowns. “Then why did you come?”

“Like I said, checking in,” she says impatiently. “Isn’t that what you wanted me to do?”

“Yes, but --” Rafael hesitates, taken aback that she’s turning this around on him. “You said you couldn’t. You told me that IAB --”

“Fuck IAB,” she says simply. “They’ve got us tied up in so much red tape we’re lucky we’ve been able to investigate at all. And they think it’s  _ our  _ fault that we haven’t been able to close the case yet.”

“Okay…” he says slowly. “I still don’t understand why you’re here. Is there something I can do to help?”

Olivia shakes her head. “No. I don’t know. I just -- I wanted to see you, okay, the last two weeks have been a bitch and I just wanted to see you.”

He feels his breath catch, because although she’s taking a stupid risk for what is objectively a frivolous reason, he understands, because he feels the same. He figured that out a long time ago, actually: she is his source of stability, and he is hers. And this is the closest either of them has come to admitting it out loud.

What he says aloud in response is the opposite: “You shouldn’t have come here, Olivia.” His voice is soft with concern. “I don’t want you in trouble, or in any danger, not for my sake. Not at all.”

She rolls her eyes. “I’m not in any danger,” she tells him. 

Rafael feels his frustration rising again, and it’s not fair to her; he knows she can’t explain anything, but seeing her -- it’s almost worse, having her here only for her to leave again; stability gone then back than gone again, leaving him off-balance and alone.

“What do you want from me, then?” he asks, and if his voice is still soft it’s only because he can’t bring himself to be harsh with her, not now. “I don’t understand.”

“No, you  _ don’t _ understand,” she half-snaps, catching herself mid-sentence so the world “understand” comes out soft and sorry.

He’s quiet for a moment, trying to read her bright eyes in the dim room (why hadn’t he turned on the lights?, he wonders, but he doesn’t move to flick them on now).

“Are you scared?” he asks at last, and she blinks, like she hadn’t expected the question. 

She begins to pace again, lifts her hand to her forehead and then drops it. “No. I’m angry.” 

She pauses to scan his concerned face, then shakes her head and resumes stalking back and forth across the room. He lifts his hand slightly when she passes where he’s standing by the couch, as if to catch her sleeve, but withdraws it without touching her. 

“Liv. Talk to me.”

She rounds on him, and though her eyes are accusatory he knows it’s not him she’s upset with.

“It’s a little boy,” she tells him through her teeth. “It’s a six-year-old boy, and these sons of bitches -- god, Rafa, I shouldn’t even be telling you this --”

“You can trust me,” he says, though he isn’t even sure he wants her to explain what’s going on, not if it’ll get both of them in trouble.

“Don’t you think I know that?” she snaps, her frustrated words at odds with their meaning.

He steps forward to where she stands, now stock still, in the middle of the room. “Maybe there’s something I can do --”

“No.”

Another step. “Even if you can’t tell me, I can --”

“ _ No _ , Rafael, you can’t,” and in her frustration she reaches out and yanks at his tie, his blue-and-green tartan tie that’s just a bit loose around his one-button-undone, end-of-the-day collar, yanks at it and he comes forward along with it, one quick step, and they’re face-to-face.

She stares at him with wide eyes, and in the back of his mind he thinks she must have pulled his tie too tight because he’s having trouble breathing.

“Liv,” he whispers, and he’s going to say something else -- something about the case, or her anger, or how he can help -- but he doesn’t. 

She closes her eyes. In her boots she’s only a half-inch or so taller than him, so it’s very easy for her to bend her neck and rest her forehead against his.

He blinks several times, very quickly, before allowing himself to close his eyes too. He can feel her breath on his lips, and he can smell her lavender shampoo, and they’re standing still in silence but his heart is racing. 

“Olivia,” he says, and her breath catches, and he kisses her.

As he does he realizes that his right hand was already laced gently through her hair -- he’d raised it when she brought her forehead against his, he remembers dimly, and as she kisses him back he rests his left gently at her waist. Feather-light and reverent. His hand is almost shaking. Her right hand is still around his tie but she throws her free arm around his neck and pulls him closer. At the same time she opens her mouth against his and he gasps and kisses back, harder, until they’re drinking each other in like they’d both been dying of thirst.

They go on like this for several minutes until he forces himself to pull away.

“We should…” his chest is heaving but he can’t bring himself to be embarrassed about it because so is hers. Her face is flushed too, pupils blown wide, hair tousled where his hand still rests in it, and he thinks he’s never seen her so beautiful. Never seen anyone, anything, as beautiful as she is in this moment.

“Come to mine,” she says, answering his unspoken worry:  _ we can’t do this here.  _

“I can’t,” he reminds her, half hating himself for it. “We can’t. You’re not even supposed to be here.”

She buries her face in his neck with a rueful laugh. “I won’t be able to get you to break the rules, will I?” she asks. 

He lifts his head up and stares at the ceiling, willing himself to do the right thing.

“No,” he says softly, lowering his face into her hair. “I’m sorry. But maybe it’s for the best.”

Olivia pulls back and looks hurt, maybe even angry, and he trips over himself to clarify: “No, no, I mean -- I want -- this. I want this. But I want to do it right, I don’t want it rushed.”

She relaxes. “Okay.” She takes a breath. “Yes.”

“How much longer until the investigation is done?” he asks, letting his hand slide down to cup her face. Her cheek is soft and warm.

Her face clouds over at the thought of it, of the little boy, and his stomach sinks slightly. He becomes painfully aware of their surroundings, too: this office where they discuss the worst of crimes, where they review pictures and evidence of suffering, and try to make right what can never be undone. He doesn’t want to do this here but he can’t bring himself to move away from her either, not even by an inch.

“Maybe another week,” she answers. “Shouldn’t be more than that.”

“Okay,” he says softly. “That’s okay. Can I take you out to dinner, afterwards? Someplace nice?”

A grin spreads across her face. “Don’t tell me you’re one of those sappy romantic types.”

He smirks. “Wouldn’t you like to find out?”

“Yes, I would,” she replies without a moment of hesitation, and he feels like his heart might burst. “I’ll go, and then it’s just one more week.”

Olivia can see it on his face, in his wonder-wide eyes. She pulls him forward for a last kiss, her hand still around his tie. 

“One more week,” he repeats, the words whispered against her mouth between kisses. 

Their bodies press her hand flat until her palm is against her chest, and she can feel her own heart pounding. 


End file.
